Israeli Election Results Held Firm as Right-Wing Claims and Interference Narratives Spread
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Israel's elections commission said the vote remains valid even if foreign interference claims prove true, while Prime Minister Netanyahu's party attacks the legitimacy of the result amid gains by Arab-led parties.
The head of Israel's elections commission, Noam Sohlberg, said the results of the recent general election will stand, even if allegations of foreign interference are later confirmed. He stressed that such suspicions would not shake the integrity of the electoral process or alter the overall election results.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party has tried to cast doubt on the outcome, alleging that Arab-led parties, which made significant gains, "stole" the vote and received funding from Qatar. Qatar has rejected these claims as part of a disinformation campaign.
In a related development, Israeli police released two political activists arrested before the elections for allegedly trying to bribe voters. One activist was released under unspecified conditions, while another remains under house arrest. The suspects were reportedly linked to the Arab-led Ra’am party, which secured eight seats in the election. Ra’am leader Mansour Abbas condemned the arrests as undemocratic and said they were meant to interfere with the election results.
Opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot accused Netanyahu of running a campaign to delegitimize the election results. Although Eisenkot has previously ruled out forming a coalition with Arab parties, the deadlock after the elections, in which Netanyahu's bloc secured 53 seats and Eisenkot's opposition bloc won 48, may force a reassessment. The three Arab-led parties won a record 19 seats, and a coalition with Eisenkot could produce a majority in the 120-seat parliament, though many in Israel view such an alliance as politically difficult.